How I had to break in order to begin to heal.
Truth be told, I dreaded even the thought of becoming a mom for many years. I have always been hyper-aware of my emotional side and am keenly self aware when it comes to recognizing my own hormonal highs and lows. Afterall I am the one who has had to live with myself for all these years. But I spent most of my post-pubescent decades ignoring my body and the warning signs that something was off, that is until I became pregnant and was forced to start taking my physical and mental health a little bit more seriously. Turns out I am not crazy! My body just hates me. Pregnancy was a total rollercoaster that I will admit, I was not prepared or ready for. Health complications contributed to heightened emotions, but nothing like the storm that I would face for months and months after giving birth to my daughter during the postpartum stage.
The word postpartum depression has such a stigma to it, one that I had associated with many awful and dreadful things. I had no idea what it actually was until I found myself 6 months PP realizing that I had been suffering from it basically since the moment I left the hospital with my newborn. A heightened and prolonged period of the incorrectly self-diagnosed baby blues were causing me grief, constant irritability and irrationality. As a teenager, I remember seeing a show about a mother who had been suffering with Postpartum Mood and Anxiety Disorder (or postpartum depression), who had subsequently drowned her babies in the bathtub after losing complete control, from that moment forward that was my understanding of the disorder, murder and death by PMADs. So to find out that I had it was pretty traumatic in itself but I eventually learned through my own struggles and experience that this disorder has many different faces and shows up in many different ways for different people, and having it DOES NOT mean that you are going to do what that mother did. For me, my PMAD has been like a hairy ball of rage and guilt. I felt (and still do at times) so angry at life which I feel in a sense has robbed me of enjoying many of the early moments with my daughter that I had looked so forward to, moments that I cannot ever get back with her. Had I only known that this hairy ball of rage and guilt was actually my body reacting to the trauma of pregnancy and childbirth, maybe I would have dealt with it a little better or gone easier on myself. Hindsight, I guess. Hopefully by writing about it I can continue healing and shed some light on it for others.
Being aware of yourself and how you feel is so incredibly important in order to be able to identify when something isn't quite right, but with a PMAD its so difficult to notice when you are off because everything is off, your mind and body are going through so many changes simultaneously all while trying to figure out this new little human in your life. I learned that PMADs can be triggered by many different things, something I was fairly unaware of beforehand. It is a nasty, intrusive and horrible lingering darkness that smacks you in your face over and over, during a time when everyone expects you to be joyful and happy and it effects everyone in its path. I like to think that my postpartum depression was brought on by a perfect storm, and there were many moving parts that contributed to it outside of the obvious hormonal imbalance that took place after giving birth. Anyone who has given birth since 2020 can likely relate to feelings of loneliness and isolation. The saying “it takes a village” could not be more true when it comes to welcoming a newborn, especially if it is your first. Full disclosure, I am a total loner and always have been and my support circle has always been small since as far back as I can remember, which has never bothered me. I’ve always enjoyed the company of one or two close friends over a large group. I get anxious easily and am a detrimental overthinker, so for me, small groups are better and that’s just how I am. But when you have a baby you need people around you, a lot of people who truly care for you. You know, the ones who will just show up for you, even when you don’t ask (or want) them to. I didn’t have that, and the effects of not having it lead me to a very dark place. I did not have the support of my family, and my husbands family was in a different country. The friends I had, outside of one, were party friends, and anyone who has had a baby knows that those friendships drop off pretty quickly the moment you become a parent. Having a baby will bring you many things in life, and it will show you who your people are, or aren’t.
After having a baby my body felt like it was in shambles. I felt like a shell of a human afterwards. Emotionally I was not okay but I didn’t know how to say it out loud. I had a plan to breastfeed, which fortunately went very well and I had no complications, she latched beautifully from the time I brought her home, however breastfeeding in itself is a challenge and it takes a lot out of you during a time when I felt like I had nothing more to give. I was so not prepared for any of this. I read everything I could possibly read about getting pregnant, being pregnant, labour, delivery… the works, but when it came to postpartum and better yet postpartum depression, or PMADs, I was uninformed and unprepared. There were (and still are) moments when I straight up hate being a mom, nobody warns you that this may happen. Let me be clear, I do not hate my baby, but there are moments when motherhood feels so strange and awkward to me, change can be really difficult for me, and sad, especially when a lot of it happens all at once which is basically the definition of becoming a parent. Your life literally changes overnight. I envy those moms who adapt to parenthood so seamlessly. I felt, and at times still do feel, ill-equipped to be a parent. I constantly doubt myself and my decision making and I get frustrated easily, which I guess is normal for any new parent but when you top it off with a mood disorder things can feel pretty overwhelming at times. I have spent days hating myself not knowing what was going on inside my mind and body. I felt shame for not knowing how to care for and love my baby unconditionally. I would get angry when she would cry. I would feel helpless and it would all come back to this awful rage and guilty feeling. But you have to sort of be your own advocate in times like this, and luckily, now that I am turning the page to a new chapter, I am finally able to do that. But it took me nine months to start to see that there is a light at the end of the tunnel, a very dim one albeit. When it comes to postpartum depression, its not a life sentence.
Some things that I wished I had known before all of this.
PMADs can be triggered at anytime. It can punch you square in the gut literally anytime within the first year, or longer, after having a baby. Those feelings of helplessness were warning signs, my body was trying to communicate that something was wrong which I wished I had listened to sooner and asked for help. Guilt is not a normal feeling, but yet it is something I find myself dealing with every single day, and it pops up out of nowhere. It is a constant conversation that I need to have with myself, to set a mental reminder that feeling guilty for things that are out of my control or that are not my fault is not normal and I need to limit the amount of energy I give to those feelings of guilt without reason. Do I show up everyday for my daughter? Yes. Am I perfect? God no, nor do I strive to be. Does that mean that I am not fit to be a mom? No, it doesn’t. Stress has been a huge trigger for me. I returned to working from home fulltime just three months after my daughter was born, not exactly the mat-leave most Canadians take. Unfortunately it was just what had to be done to support my family so I did what I had to do. Starting work so soon after having a baby was a contributing factor, and working from home while trying to adapt to motherhood was a huge challenge. I learned the hard way that giving 100% of myself to both work and motherhood was impossible. I began to feel very stuck and overwhelmed and it was extremely difficult to carve out time for myself between work, breastfeeding, taking care of myself just enough so I could think straight and figuring out the whole parenting thing. As an introvert, I need time to be alone. We forget that just because we become parents our personalities don’t suddenly change, not overnight at least. As a new mom without support it was impossible to take that time for myself. When you have an infant who is exclusively breastfed, you need to be around. After speaking to a therapist, she advised me to find a way to slow down and she validated me by acknowledging that I was taking on too much to soon, and that any normal human being would be feeling overwhelmed. My husband and I ultimately made the decision to leave Canada and move back to his home in Mexico where we could be closer to our village, and I am happy to share that after a long 9 months things are finally starting to level out with me emotionally and I feel like I am more myself these days.
I wish that more people talked openly about their struggles in dealing with PMADs, or depression in general, or even just the baby blues because those are also super heavy. I remember leaving the hospital with my partner and my newborn and I was crying hysterically and not even understanding why I was crying. What a wild time. I assumed it was just the baby blues and told myself it was normal, but when it continued on and on for months and eventually grew bigger and bigger, I had to eventually acknowledge that something wasn’t right. Had I been honest and told my doctor about how I was feeling, she likely would have flagged me for PMADs but it wasn’t until my husband brought it up in a way that made me reflect and see what was happening on the outside, which is when I knew I really wasn’t myself. Having a baby changes you in so many ways which makes it hard to differentiate what is normal and what is a red flag. Feeling intense guilt, rage, sadness or helplessness is not normal and should not be ignored because ignoring the problem only contributes to feeling more isolated and more alone. Lately I am finding peace in taking time for myself so that I can show up properly for my kid, which I believe is the key to becoming a good parent. Taking time to write, practice yoga, even just practice taking a damn breath every once in a while. It is so easy to just forget these things and lose yourself after having a baby.
If you are suffering with PMADs or any other type of mental health issue, I hope you find strength to talk about it, share your story and if you need to, ask for help. There is light at the end of the tunnel.
